The memories...

Some time in late 1999...
This was just about how I felt as I extricated myself from the drain. The very next moment I was  hopping on one foot, trying my utmost to to swallow the lump in my throat as angry tears forced their way through. Aiming that kick at that old steel beast of a bicycle had not been a smart move. 

The next day...
The 'half-pedal' technique looked like a lot of fun, but apparently I had neither the talent nor any of the guts that these boys do! Attempting it on my Photon had given me a spectacular set of bruises.

"Alright, one last shot."
I clambered on to the saddle and tensed for the pain as my father gave the bike a push. I could almost taste the hard asphalt on my knee as I wobbled precariously towards the dirt path sloping down into the football ground on the right. If I HAD to land flat on my face, I would rather do it on the grass. I placed my feet firmly on the pedals and...
"Wheeeeee......" 
Words fail me here. How am I supposed to describe something as wonderful as that? It was something close to flying, the wind rushing in my ears, through my hair, over the throbbing welts on my knees and elbows; to an eight-year-old boy, it was nothing short of a miracle! I tried to turn the handlebar and... SPLAT! The grass rushed up to greet my face with all the grace of solid concrete. That stank, but I just could not stop grinning! The beast had been tamed. 

2000-2011
In the following eight years, I had graduated from the narrow, short lane our house overlooked to the  broader and busier roads that led to my school and to the homes of my various tutors at the various ends of the town. It had taken a considerable amount of ingenuity on my part to wheedle the permission out of my mother, mind you. (Weave your way through the traffic of Burdwan for eight years, and you would never need to work on your bike-handling skills again. You can take my word for it.) But despite the speed limit of 5 kilometers per hour and the distance limit of 4 kilometers imposed on me, I had sneaked to the outskirts of the town enough times and breathed in enough fresh air to sorely miss the bike during my three years in college... until when it came back to me at Bangalore.

January 2013
I huffed, puffed and heaved on the pedals of my Schwinn Sporterra. The three of us had managed to reach only the edge of Kanakpura after five hours of riding. The Bheemeswari fishing camp was still a mind-numbing 50 km away. The sun was merciless, the gradients unrelenting; the straps of my backpack were cutting into my shoulders. "Why was I doing this? I could be chilling at home playing video games or something!"

We took a pitstop just outside Kanakpura. That's me on the left. I definitely look happier than I felt. It was a dumb idea to carry such huge backpacks, as we found out to our cost!

I could barely move by the time we rolled into Kanakpura. My T-shirt clung to the front of my torso, the outline of a massive white crust just starting to make itself visible. I could see white streaks on the sun-browned faces of my two friends, and realised my own face could not have looked much better. We stopped at the first baker's we could find on the side of the road and shakily pointed at a couple of cakes and a large can of Red Bull energy drink. THAT-WAS-THE-BEST-MEAL-EVER!! Did it help? Hell yeah!

The Red Bull effect!

 I felt no pain in the following 40 kilometers, but only a numb sense of euphoria. The views helped, too!

 

Our second pitstop was 10 kilometers from our destination. How could we not take a moment to absorb the enormity of this stunning vista? I cannot recall exactly how I felt when we crawled into the fishing camp an hour later. The world was a haze; all I wanted to do was drop everything, go to sleep  and not wake up even if the apocalypse chose that day to arrive. But sleep had to wait.

My legs quivered like a newborn kitten as I lowered myself into the freezing current of the Kaveri. I relaxed and floated on my back, feeling the lively thrum of the river as it washed over me. I closed my eyes. Time stopped.

THIS, ladies and gentlemen, was what we had been carrying on our backs. It had been a proper demented murder on the shoulders, but it added the finishing touches to our great adventure. Sometimes even I have a hard time believing we had  managed to pull it off.

All the pains of the journey were forgotten when we woke up to this the following morning. Every bit of that suffering had been worth it, just to see the sun rise over the Kaveri. Four hours after this photo was taken, we hitched a lift on a Bangalore-bound truck at Kanakpura and came back, nursing severe sunburns and terribly aching legs. But we had realised that the limits lay only within our own minds. We had suffered like never before, but we would jump at the very next chance of doing it all over again!

The Bheemeswari sufferfest, as it turned out, was to be the first of our many adventures. The last two years have been rather eventful.

I fell in love with this beautiful machine the instant I set my eyes upon it! It has been a faithful companion through several brevets and numerous other century rides. And yes, the painful rite of skinning knees was duly performed when the shift was made to clipless pedals. This bike is the cause I am a Strava junkie now.

As someone who likes to spend a lot of time in the TT-tuck, I regularly smash up my mother's distance and speed limits these days (I don't tell her! I would much appreciate it if you did not, either!). I have lost count of  how many times I have struggled up that accursed hillock past Devanahalli with my mates. The BBCh races are next on the bucketlist.   

I also hold a record for having a higher number of flats than anyone I know! Could be plain bad luck, or something could be wrong with my tyres. Any advices?   

And to top it all, we IISc peeps even have our own jersey now!

Riding can become suffering in its purest form when done with a fitter and faster group of people. You can only marvel at how fast your childlike joy can mutate into paralysing horror when you are stuck with a swarm of gym rats and Peter Sagan wannabes. But what makes it all worth it, is the rare chance you are offered to find out how much pain you can actually take. (Remember the rules!!) And of course as side-benefits you get to take photos like these,

and show off your tan lines (a badge of honour) and have awesome recovery drinks aaand offer a legitimate excuse for shaving your legs!
I am really glad the bike came into my life when it did!